If you happen to be a heavy coffee drinker, you might
be helping your brain protect itself from Alzheimer’s disease.

While a number of advanced Alzheimer’s drugs and treatments
have been developed in recent years, University of Florida researcher Gary
Arendash believes coffee drinkers -- and other caffeine consumers -- are
not just protecting themselves, but actually treating symptoms that might
appear.

“The study gives evidence that caffeine may be a viable
treatment for established Alzheimer’s disease and not simply a protective
strategy,” Arendash said.

Human subjects were not used in the study, only mice.
But Arendash and his colleagues believe the findings offer up a lot of
hope. Using mice that were bred to develop Alzheimer’s, the fed half of
the laboratory animals a heavy diet of caffeine once they saw signs of
the disease.

In other words, they waited until after the mice had developed
Alzheimer’s disease before beginning the treatment.

Arendash said the research team was surprised at the results.
The mice fed the caffeine performed much better on memory tests than those
that didn’t receive the caffeine.

Alzheimer’s currently is an incurable, progressively fatal
disease that affects humans as they age, robbing them of all memory functions.
The researchers say the fact that they have been able to reverse the disease’s
effects on cognitive ability is particularly significant.

Recent research into Alzheimer’s treatment has focused
on the clumps that form in the brains of Alzheimer’s patients, interrupting
normal memory function. The clumps are sometimes caused by two enzymes
and heavy doses of caffeine, it appears, prevents those enzymes from forming.

Researchers say they are eager to launch clinical trials
with human subjects, believing they are close to ending a scourge of aging.
They say caffeine is safe for most people and easily absorbed by the brain,
and appears to directly attack the disease.

More than five million people in the U.S. are living with
Alzheimer’s disease, according to the Alzheimer’s Association. Alzheimer’s
and dementia triple the health care costs for people age 65 and older.